Sheikh Hamza Yusuf is a cleric and scholar of Quran who received classical training in the Muslim world and is founding the first Muslim seminary in the United States, Zaytuna Institute, in Hayward, Calif. He was born and educated in the United States and converted to Islam as a youth. He is notable for his scholarly […]

John Kelsay is distinguished research professor at Florida State University in Tallahassee.  He specializes in comparative religious ethics, religion and war, and peace and has written extensively about Islam and war. His publications include Arguing the Just War in Islam. He can speak to Islamic law and warfare.

Sh’ma: A Journal of Jewish Responsibility is a monthly magazine that contains essays about a central issue in Judaism, such as rituals, family life and Israel. It was founded by Eugene Borowitz and is edited by Susan Berrin.

Earlier in April, the liberal watchdog Media Matters highlighted columns by Bryan Fischer, the American Family Association’s director of issue analysis for government and public policy, in which he advocated halting immigration of Muslims and repatriating them to Islamic countries. Fischer also said that Muslims who convert could “become not just good Christians but true Americans.”

On April 23, 2010, Lifeway Research released a survey showing that Protestant pastors in the U.S. have a negative view of Islam and more than half agree with Franklin Graham’s statement that Islam is an “evil” religion.

Read an April 22, 2010, post at Religion Dispatches by Hussein Rashid, a Muslim theologian and widely cited commentator, who says the RevolutionMuslim.com leaders who sent a warning to  South Park creators about censoring inappropriate content do not understand or represent Islam.

Read an April 22, 2010, New York Times article about controversy over depictions of Islam in the show South Park and the statements from the show’s producers objecting to censoring of the program.

Read an April 22, 2010, Christianity Today blog post about Franklin Graham’s rescinded invitation to a Pentagon prayer service due to his comments about Islam.  

The popular uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa, the so-called “Arab Spring” that endured through the summer of 2011, had for some in the West recast Muslims and Islamic societies as promoters of democracy and values that resonate with Americans.